As hundreds of spandex superhero suited cyclists get ready to start the Tour de France this weekend, seven-time ex-victor and scorned Texan Lance Armstrong has decided to take a stand, telling France's Le Monde newspaper that cycling's most prestigious and grueling race is "impossible to win without doping."

Armstrong, who has famously had his Tour victories erased from the annals of cycling history, wants to point out that doping is so widespread in the sport that he "just took part in the system."

This may or may not be true.

What is true is that we now live in a culture that not only expects doping, but encourages it, even in day-to-day life.

So-called performance enhancing beverages featuring high-tech cocktails of potent (and often spurious) ingredients are the dominant space holder in convenience store coolers. The granddaddy of them all, Red Bull, has such a hold on action sport cultures like skateboarding and BMX they own their own magazine. You can get over-the-counter energy boosts in almost any form — from taurine-infused M&M knockoffs to Aeroshot caffeine mist to the Turbo Snort, a caffeinated nasal spray that provides up to "400 hours of energy" (?!). Let's not forget the fun that is Four Loko, a caffeinated malt beverage the media vilified until bath salts came along and stole the "crazy over-the-counter substance" title. 5 Hour Energy, once viewed with the same sidelong looks as trucker speed, is now so ubiquitous that they sell it at some college bookstores.

This doesn't excuse what Armstrong did any more than his weak cry of "everyone else was doing it, so I did, too."

There's a public trust placed in our professional athletes, which, while oft broken, is inherent in the position.

Call me a romantic, but I personally refuse to believe that the majority of men in the peloton are hopped up on a sophisticated cycle of blood transfusions, injections, and testosterone patches in hopes of steamrolling past their shaven-legged brethren. When Armstrong says he did it just because everyone else did, it doesn't defend his case; it makes him look like a whiny, spiteful has-been. While it's apparent that a "culture of doping" does, or did, exist in cycling, to focus only on that, and to let Armstrong draw our attention to it and steal the media spotlight yet again in the days leading up to cycling's marquee event, diminishes the intensely hard, drug-free life's work the majority of Tour competitors have put in.

If Armstrong really wants to make a difference, he should stand up and be a man, admit what he did, then shut up and let his future actions determine if they can sway his legacy. Pledging to "dedicate your life to making up for" a past mistake is great, but creating a media spectacle of yourself by finger-pointing and making excuses isn't working for change; it's showboating for attention.